


Paradise

by oselle



Series: Birthright [35]
Category: The Faculty (1998)
Genre: Alien Resistance, Aliens, Alternate Universe, Angst, Conspiracy, Gen, Mental Health Issues, Prostitution
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-03
Updated: 2013-09-03
Packaged: 2017-12-25 12:48:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/953283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oselle/pseuds/oselle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Casey, struggling to find a way forward.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Paradise

The motel is named Paradise. Casey could stay someplace better, much better – there are good hotels in the city center and decent chains not far from here but he always finds himself in places like the Paradise when he travels alone.  
  
He puts his bag down and takes off his coat. After a few seconds of fiddling, the window heater kicks on with a noisy _thunk_ , exhaling warm air that smells of cigarettes. He sits down on the bed and counts the cigarette burns in the bedspread. Four. He lights up himself and adds his own smoke to the room's miasma.  
  
He turns on the television and watches it listlessly. The traces of yesterday's bad headache are clinging to him, a faint buzzing inside his head. He felt so sick on the plane that he holed himself up in the bathroom until the flight attendant rapped on the door to ask him if he was all right. When he got back to his seat he sat there clutching the airsick bag, waiting for his medication to work. He must have looked pretty green because the woman next to him asked to change her seat. He finally settled into a semi-conscious doze, imagining that Zeke was with him, holding his hand.  
  
Now the local news is on. The anchor reports an Amber Alert for a girl who went missing from a local shopping mall. Casey sits up in bed and roots through his bag for his notebook and a pen. These stories usually wound up with a body being recovered, some pervert getting marched off by the cops. Sometimes the kids just come back. But sometimes they're never seen again.  
  
Casey reaches back into his bag and pulls out his files and the envelope of clippings that go with them, clippings and microfilm printouts, some of them from newspaper stories that are years old. Missing children. Unusual clusters of deaths. Foster care abuses. When a kid from the clippings turns up in one of the files, he highlights the name in his notebook, with a little "d" next to it, for deceased. Now he writes "Jennifer Sherman," the girl from tonight's Amber Alert, in the notebook, adding the city and the date. He opens a file, one of the latest, lights up a cigarette and gets down to his work.  


  
_____  
  


Casey adds two new burns to the bedspread over the next hour and a half, muttering "shit" under his breath each time and stamping out the smoldering hole with his hand. It's late and his eyes ache from straining to read the files in the room's sulfurous light. The headache is pressing insistently at the front of his skull.  
  
He puts the plastic ashtray on the nightstand and kicks the files off to the empty side of the bed so he can lie down. The television flickers bluely through his closed eyes, but he doesn't want to turn it off and have no company other than the thunking of the heater and the occasional splash of headlights on the window. He peels down the bedspread enough to expose the pillow and turns his face into it, breathing in stale smoke and dryer-burn.  
  
Casey jolts awake some time later, a nightmare breaking up behind his eyelids. Blood, there was blood, a lot of it, his own; he can't remember the details and doesn't try to, but the image of bloody bandages remains with him, and the smell of surgical disinfectant and wounds. He reaches out to the other side of the bed, grasping frantically before he realizes there's no one there and he sits up in bed, not knowing where he is, paralyzed by the old sense of panic and confusion. The present slowly slots itself back into his mind, piece by piece.  
  
Casey makes himself breathe deeply and tells himself that he is all right, even though he knows he is _not_ all right, it has been years since he was anything close to all right, and he will never be all right again. Dr. Stanley laid it all out for him more than two years ago, that even with the treatments and medication, there would always be moments like this, moments of _slipping_. That's how Casey always thinks of it – slipping, like walking on ice and suddenly losing his footing, sliding away, slipping under the black water. Casey has been slipping a lot lately, and he knows that he should go back to Montana, rest. Get himself together. Wait for Zeke to come back. But then they would know he's sick, then _Zeke_ would know, and would want him to stay in Montana. Or would want them to leave, both of them. And sometimes Casey wants that, wants it so badly that it shames and angers him.  
  
"Okay, okay," he mutters, and swings his legs over the edge of the bed. He needs to eat something. Zeke always made sure that Casey ate but Zeke isn't here and Casey has been letting things like eating and sleeping fall to the wayside. Has been letting them slip.  
  
He puts on his coat and stuffs the room key in his pocket. Outside it's dark, and late. He has no car, not trusting himself behind the wheel, so wherever he's going he has to go on foot. He buttons his coat and starts walking.  


  
_____  
  


The streets here remind Casey of East St. Louis, where he got lost once many years before. Like most of the memories of his sick years, the ones of East St. Louis are swirling and confused, images seen through a rain-slicked window. He remembers the darkness of the streets, the alleys and the chain-link fences topped with wire, how he walked until he was exhausted and beyond terrified, finally hiding himself in a phone booth where he silently and agonizingly pleaded for Zeke to find him. In this memory only Zeke stands out clearly. Zeke found him, as Casey had known he would. Zeke found him and took him home – to whatever place they were staying in, anyway – took him home on a city bus. Casey remembers that bus ride vividly. Zeke held his hand all the way home, his clothes smelling of cigarettes and sweat, and Casey laid his head on Zeke's shoulder, breathing him in and filled with indescribable relief.  
  
Casey is shaky on his feet and the sense of slipping that he woke up with has not left him; twice he has to stop and remind himself where he is. He considers going back to the motel and ordering a pizza but then he thinks about the droning television, the smoke, his files spread out on the bed and the remnants of his blood-soaked nightmare and he doesn't want to go back there. It is cold out and at least that is something – it feels clean and real on his face and it steadies him.  
  
Casey walks on and finds himself on a street whose shops are still open despite the late hour. It's the usual rundown collection of adult video stores, body piercing parlors and bars; sandwiched between one of the bars and a newsstand is a fluorescent storefront with a neon "Fried Chicken" sign buzzing in the window.  
  
The white glare hurts Casey's eyes and the greasy smell makes his stomach lurch. Besides the fry cook in his stained apron, there is no one in the place except a kid who stands with one elbow propped against the wall counter, drinking from a Styrofoam cup. He glances at Casey and then looks away, bored.  
  
Casey can't deal with the chicken so he orders french fries and a soda. The cook fills his order wordlessly. Behind him, Casey can hear the popping sound of the kid tearing his Styrofoam cup into strips.  
  
Casey sits down at a sticky table that's littered with straw wrappers and ashes. He clears a space for himself. Outside, cars pass sporadically.  
  
"Hey," someone says. Casey looks up and sees the kid who was standing by the counter.  
  
"Do you mind if I sit here?"  
  
Casey glances at the two other tables. They are both empty.  
  
"Just for a minute," the kid says. Casey shrugs.  
  
The kid pulls out a chair and sits down. He looks young – eighteen maybe, but certainly no more. Probably less. He's of average height but a slouching stoop makes him look shorter; his rangy frame is padded by a gray hooded sweatshirt and green military jacket. He has heavy-lidded eyes and a tousle of dark, finger-combed hair. He pulls a pack of cigarettes from his jacket. Chipped polish clings to three of his fingernails.  
  
"Mind if I smoke?"  
  
"No," Casey says.  
  
"Want one?"  
  
"That's okay." Casey goes back to looking out the window. He rolls the wrapper of his straw up into a little ball.  
  
The kid takes a drag on the cigarette and releases it in a long spout. Casey watches him from the corner of his eye.  
  
"What are you doing here?" the kid asks suddenly. Casey looks at him.  
  
"What?"  
  
"What are you doing here?"  
  
"Getting something to eat."  
  
The kid glances at Casey's untouched fries. "You're not eating."  
  
"Guess I wasn't hungry."  
  
The kid barks out a smoky laugh. "That's smart. You don't want to eat anything here." He cocks his head at Casey. "No one comes here to eat."  
  
Casey meets the kid's sleepy eyes.  
  
"Why do they come here?"  
  
The kid leans back in his chair. He looks out the window for a moment, then back at Casey, a curtain of smoke hanging between them.  
  
"Are you hustling?" he asks conversationally.  
  
 _Ah, fuck,_ Casey thinks. _Fuck._ His head pounds. The kid leans towards him, his forearms on the table.  
  
"If you're hustling, you want to go somewhere else. Go over to Ninth Street or something. Me and Carl hustle this block."  
  
"No," Casey says. "I'm not hustling. I'm not even from around here."  
  
The kid considers this. He looks Casey up and down, then smiles. He takes one of Casey's french fries and eats it, relaxing back in his chair.  
  
"Okay, sorry about that. Just checking, you know. Gotta look out for my interests."  
  
"Sure," Casey says. "Look, if it's all the same to you, I'm going to go and sit over there."  
  
He starts to get up and the kid suddenly leans over, his hand out.  
  
"Listen, um…I really am sorry about that. I'm sorry. Maybe you could just sit here for a few minutes and just talk, okay? Or pretend to talk? 'Cause it's goddamn cold out and this guy…" He twitches his head towards the fry cook, "Is gonna kick me outta here if I don't order something."  
  
The kid looks very young. Sixteen at most, Casey thinks, the age he was when his parents sent him away. Not any older than some of the kids in his files. He sits down and the kid smiles.  
  
"Thanks, really. Thanks."  
  
Casey nods and eats a french fry. It's gone cold and it tastes like old grease. They sit together in uncomfortable silence for a few minutes. The kid smokes. Casey tries to eat, hoping it will make him feel better. His vision is starting to waver around the edges. He holds on tightly to a corner of the table.  
  
"Hey, where are you from, anyway?" the kid finally asks. "You said you weren't from around here."  
  
Casey thinks about Ohio. Montana. Minnesota.  
  
"St. Louis," he says. "East St. Louis."  
  
"Don't know it," the kid said. "I'm from Montrose. It's about two hours from here. Nowhere, really." He puts his hand out suddenly. "My name's Jamie."  
  
Casey shakes Jamie's hand cautiously.  
  
Jamie smiles. "What's East St. Louis like? I've been thinking of relocating." He glances out the window. "Business sucks."  
  
 _What's it like?_ Casey thinks. _I don't know what it was like. I remember a room and Zeke was gone and then it was dark and I was lost. Zeke found me. I knew he would. He could always find me when I was lost._ He sees himself on the bus, Zeke holding his hand, Zeke's jacket scratchy and real against his cheek.  
  
"I think it's a lot like this," Casey says.  
  
"Oh well, _that's_ no good."  
  
Casey laughs faintly. "Not really."  
  
"Why are you here…I mean, why are you in town?"  
  
"Work," Casey says.  
  
"What sort of work?"  
  
"I um…" He closes his eyes and rubs his forehead and thinks of work, his real work and what he does on his own. The files, those files spread out on the bed in the motel. "I look for lost children."  
  
"Are you shitting me?" Jamie asks, laughing.  
  
"No."  
  
Jamie goes quiet. Casey rubs his forehead and the back of his neck and he's thinking about Zeke, holding his hand on the bus, Zeke who could always find him, whether he was lost in East St. Louis or in the scarred terrain of his own head, Zeke's hands, Zeke's voice, the solidity of Zeke's body and presence when everything else kept slipping away.  
  
"Do you ever find them?" Jamie asks, and Casey looks up, not understanding. Jamie is gazing at him soberly, not laughing now.  
  
"These kids, do you ever find them?"  
  
"No. No I don't."  
  
 _Zeke could always find me, he always found me when I was lost. When I was lost…_  
  
"Why not?"  
  
"Because they're…they're already gone. It's too late."  
  
"Yeah," Jamie says. "I know."  
  
 _You don't know. You think you know what's out there but you don't, you don't know how…how lost…_  
  
"Um…" Casey says. "I think I should…" He tries to get up, but he's suddenly dizzy and he's slipping, has slipped, he's under the black water and the frozen surface is far away, receding.  
  
"Hey," Jamie says. He puts his hand on Casey's arm and Casey doesn't pull back.  
  
"Are you okay?"  
  
"I have a headache. I get headaches." Jamie's hand stays on his arm, real and solid.  
  
"Do you want some company?" Jamie asks. Casey looks up. Jamie smiles and slides his hand down to cover Casey's.  
  
"I think you need some company," he says softly. He turns his hand under Casey's and weaves their fingers together. Casey stares at their linked hands.  
  
"Okay," Casey whispers, and it seems as if the word has come from someone, somewhere else.  
  
"Do you have any money?" Jamie asks. Casey nods.  
  
"I know a place where we can go."  
  
They stand up. They go out onto the street. Casey stumbles a little and Jamie puts an arm around his shoulders and holds onto him.  
  
"Easy," he says. "It's dark." Casey leans against him.  
  
Jamie takes him around the block and down concrete steps. He shoulders open a door that leads into some sort of basement. There's a bare lightbulb outside the door but it's dark inside. The floor is gritty beneath Casey's feet. A staircase leads up into blackness. It's like the places where he and Zeke stayed, like East St. Louis, where Casey got lost and Zeke found him.  
  
Casey lets Jamie put him up against the wall. He lets Jamie unbutton his coat. He reaches out and wraps his arms around Jamie and Jamie tenses for a second before letting out a small, surprised laugh.  
  
"Yeah, okay," Jamie says. He slips an arm around Casey's waist and presses against him. The full, sudden contact of that embrace makes Casey moan from deep inside his chest. He clutches at the back of the green army jacket and buries his forehead into Jamie's shoulder.  
  
"Jesus, take it easy," Jamie says into Casey's ear. He laughs again and his breath is warm and wet. He rubs the back of Casey's neck and then tips Casey's head back and kisses him with a wide-open mouth and Casey isn't in East St. Louis, he's in Minnesota, in Minnesota at Christmas. Zeke kissing him, kissing the side of his face, from his mouth to his temple, three, four times, hard enough to roll Casey's head back into the pillow. Zeke on top of him, an arm around his waist. Zeke's hand around his. A spring creaking in the sofabed when Zeke shifts, when Zeke kisses him. _It's all right, Casey_ , he says. _It's all right, it's all right_ and Casey feels so safe, so safe for one charmed, fleeting moment.  
  
Jamie's mouth is gone and Casey turns to rest his cheek against Jamie's shoulder but it disappears from beneath him. Jamie is sliding down to his knees and his hands are inside the waistband of Casey's jeans, the tips of his fingers icy against Casey's stomach.  
  
And suddenly it all comes back. There isn't any East St. Louis, no Minnesota, only a sick, sad weariness and the headache and the basement's cold, garbagey funk and this kid, this boy on his knees before him. Casey closes his eyes briefly and draws a long, shuddering breath.  
  
He puts a hand on Jamie's head. Jamie looks up, half his face lit by the weak bulb outside.  
  
"Just a sec, my fingers are cold," he says.  
  
"No," Casey says. "Stop."  
  
Jamie pauses. "You want something else?"  
  
Casey shakes his head. "No. I don't want anything. Just get up, okay? Please get up."  
  
Jamie gets to his feet and Casey starts buttoning his coat.  
  
"You still have to pay me, you know," Jamie blurts out, and his voice is childlike, his expression almost sheepish. "Twenty bucks. For my time."  
  
Casey pulls out his wallet. He has seventy-two dollars inside and he hands this over to Jamie. Jamie turns the bills over in his hand.  
  
"You sure you don't want me to do… _something_?"  
  
"Yes," Casey says. He puts away his wallet and buttons his coat up to his neck. "No…go home. You should go home."  
  
"Yeah, right," Jamie says with a smirk, and stuffs the money in his pocket. "Thanks. You're a pretty easy date."  
  
Casey breathes out a dry laugh. He brushes past Jamie. In the doorway, he turns around. Jamie has taken out the money and is counting it.  
  
"Jamie?" Casey says.  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"Be careful, okay? You don't know what's out there."  
  
"I'm always careful," Jamie says. He smiles. "Keep looking for those kids. Maybe you'll find one."  
  
"I will," Casey says and then he's outside and up the stairs, back on the street.  


  
_____  
  


What Casey remembers of his years with Zeke is dim and changeable but some things stand out vividly, like totems – a key swinging from the rearview mirror, a sudden downpour on the highway, a sweater he wore until it finally unraveled. Entire periods of time are lost to him, but Casey can recall certain days with that same, totemic clarity.  
  
In Minnesota on a high, clear day in November, they took a drive out for no reason except to get out before snow sealed them up in the trailer. That was the day they saw the windmills, and Casey can still remember how the brown grass rippled in the steady wind and the beating-heart sound of the windmills over the long prairie.  
  
They drove home on almost empty roads, as the sun westered and lay coppery over the land, the sky turning purple above it. Casey remembers fenced lots of farm equipment as silent and monolithic as dinosaur bones. Now and then in the distance, grain elevators painted gold by the setting sun. A tiny airport, one orange windsock belling out over the runway. Zeke smoking, hitting the radio buttons as the stations faded in and out.  
  
Night came before they reached home and Casey fell asleep. He woke up not in the car but in bed, and it must have been very late because Zeke was already sleeping beside him. The wind whispered at the window frames but otherwise it was still and Casey could feel the deep silence all around them. He wondered if anyone had really been meant to live in such emptiness, or if those lonely plains had instead been made for them, a place to rest and be sheltered by blowing wind and endless sky.  
  
At the Paradise Motel, Casey turns off the television. He gathers up the files and the clippings and his notebook and puts them back into his bag; he won't be looking at them again tonight, he won't be thinking about anything that happened tonight. He takes all of his medication, the pills that are supposed to keep him from slipping away, though he knows they won't do anything to quell the ache that made him cry out when the boy pressed against him, the longing to be with Zeke and to be away from all this, to feel once more the safety and peace of those days on the northern plains.  
  
Casey gets into bed and turns off the light. He doesn't want to walk away, but for now he will allow himself to dream unrestrained about it all being over, no more places to go or work to do, no slipping, no illness. All of it, over, and then there will be time for high plains and tall grass, for home in a place meant for wind and sky, for enduring rest at last upon the quiet earth.


End file.
